WACO—Regardless of a teenager’s background or future hope, speakers at Congreso 2018 urged students to choose to serve Christ.

Leaders at the event for Texas Baptist Hispanic students—held at the Ferrell Center on the Baylor University campus—selected Philippians 4:8-9 at its theme. In that New Testament passage, the Apostle Paul calls the church at Philippi to pursue whatever is right, good and lovely, and he urged the church to put those virtues in practice for God’s service.

‘Are you going to be desperate enough?’

Often, that pursuit and the call to service begin with a change of plans, said Jason Paredes, pastor of Fielder Church in Arlington. He described how his desire to become a doctor changed when God called him to ministry.

Paredes challenged students to acknowledge how incomplete they are without God.

“Are you going to be desperate enough to pursue whatever God wants you to pursue?” he asked. “Otherwise you will settle for lesser things.”

What people pursue is what controls them, he insisted. Therefore, Christians must pursue God in everything, he said.

Although past experiences can leave wounds and scars, God always is willing to welcome people back when they stray, Paredes said.

“The love of God for us is pursuing, it’s unconditional, and it is relentless,” Paredes said.

Some people may think they are not good enough to serve God, but they need to know what kind of love God offers, Paredes said.

“God’s love can overcome every heart,” he said, adding that to think otherwise is to believe the lies of the devil.

No matter how far some people wander from God’s will, “God’s love is always open to receive them,” he said.

‘A decision that will have an impact’

To pursue God at a young age can have long lasting effects, said Ellis Orozco, pastor of First Baptist Church in Richardson.

“You are making a decision that will have an impact,” Orozco said.

As teenagers start to choose who they want to become, Orozco said, they must remember the passion God has given them must be used for his kingdom.

Like the Apostle Paul, Christians today must want “Jesus to be the passion that drives them,” he insisted.

God leads many Christians to pursue careers outside of church ministry, but their passion for Christ should drive them to be the best they can be, he asserted.

“When you put Christ over what you do, that is when you live the life you are meant to live,” Orozco said.

At that point, young people find the “sweet spot” where passion and mission meet, he said.

“God created you exactly the way you are so that you would follow him,” Orozco said. “Live the life God created you to live.”

PORT ARTHUR—During three decades at Procter Baptist Church in Port Arthur, Pastor Rick Erwin has experienced fire and flood—the former figurative and the latter literal.

For Erwin, age 72, a framed image on his office wall says it all: “Grateful, Thankful, Blessed.”

Deeply involved in missions

Erwin, who celebrated his 30^th anniversary at Procter Baptist Church April 29, led the congregation to become deeply involved in missions. The church has sponsored a Spanish-language mission congregation in Alpine, ministered to evacuees from South Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina, provided meals both to homeless and homebound individuals, and met local needs through its We Care home-repair ministry.

Through the years, Erwin grew to realize the generous and supportive spirit of the congregation. Procter Baptist committed to make its facility available to other Christian groups, whether that meant serving as a hub for the Samaritan’s Purse Operation Christmas Child ministry, providing a base of operations for disaster relief volunteers or sharing its building with another congregation.

When First Baptist Church in Port Arthur sold its building and property, Procter Baptist invited its sister congregation to use its facility—at no cost—for worship and Bible study on Sunday and provide office space during the week until First Baptist could relocate to a permanent home. The two congregations shared one building for two and a half years.

Facing challenges

Erwin learned even more about the spirit of his congregation in 2010, when he faced a fiery trial, battling prostate cancer. At the lowest point, when he developed sepsis and spent 40 days in a coma, the congregation rallied. The church provided support for his family, leadership in his absence and prayer for his recovery.

“They prayed me out of it,” Erwin said, his voice choking with emotion.

Last August, Procter Baptist Church faced its greatest challenge, when Hurricane Harvey devastated much of Southeast Texas and flooded the entire church facility with three feet of water.

“It’s been called a 500-year flood,” Erwin said. “The water came up so fast, people were running for their lives.”

When the city’s pumps failed and the water rose, Erwin and his wife, Lynn, feared for the safety of her mother, who was in a Port Arthur nursing home in a flooded area.

“She was in a precarious situation, and we knew she would be scared to death,” he said.

So, Erwin drove his four-wheel-drive pickup truck as close to the affected area as he could, and a volunteer with a boat offered to give him a ride to the nursing home to rescue his mother-in-law.

“On the way, I looked over and saw our church for the first time,” he recalled. “The sign outside was almost underwater, and I could see water inside the church through the windows. That’s when I realized it was total devastation.”

With assistance from volunteers and law enforcement personnel, Erwin moved his mother-in-law in her wheelchair out of the flooded nursing home and into a boat. She stayed at his home in Nederland for three weeks.

“A doctor from our church helped with her care until we could move her to a facility in Beaumont,” he said.

The Erwins faced their own challenges, when about a foot of water swept into their home, causing more than $45,000 damage.

“I consider that nothing compared to the people who lost everything,” Erwin said.

Answered prayer

While he minimized the personal losses, he recognized the magnitude of the loss sustained by Procter Baptist, since the church lacked insurance to cover damage caused by rising water.

“I called the church to prayer,” he said. “Church members asked me, ‘What are we going to do?’ All I could say was: ‘God hasn’t told us yet. Keep praying.’”

The answer arrived when Erwin received an unexpected phone call from a Samaritan’s Purse representative.

“He said Franklin Graham (president of Samaritan’s Purse) remembered when Procter opened its facilities” to relief workers after Hurricane Ike and Hurricane Rita, Erwin said.

The official said he was prepared to send the church a $27,000 check immediately to help start rebuilding, and the organization had approved Procter Baptist for a $100,000 grant it could draw upon as renovations continued—with the understanding more money could be available if necessary.

“God gave us the boost we needed,” Erwin said.

Help from near and far

Volunteers from the church tore out damaged drywall, removed water-soaked furniture and disinfected the facility. In four weeks, the church was able to worship in its sanctuary—albeit on bare floors, surrounded by walls with exposed studs and using a portable sound system.

“We had as many attend worship that fourth Sunday as on the Sunday before the flood happened,” Erwin said. “I told the people that every Sunday going forward, they should look for at least one thing God had given us that week.”

The Baptist General Convention of Texas church architecture staff consulted with leaders of the congregation and redesigned the sanctuary to make the best use of available space.

Volunteer teams began to contact the church from as far away as the West Coast and East Coast, asking if they could travel to Port Arthur to help the church. Erwin not only coordinated the volunteer teams, but also worked alongside the visiting teams and his own church members.

“These days, it’s not uncommon to see the pastor covered in sawdust or with a paint roller in hand,” said Tonja Hurt, the pastor’s assistant and the church’s financial secretary. “He has managed to continue the daily workings of the church on top of organizing the repair efforts.”

Erwin succeeded in preaching each Sunday, making hospital visits, conducting funerals and overseeing the reconstruction effort while dealing with another health setback. Several months ago, he had surgery at M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston to remove a particularly aggressive skin cancer beneath his left eye.

‘We never stopped doing ministry’

Today, Procter Baptist continues the rebuilding process. About half of the facility has been renovated, but the church continues its full range of programs.

“We never stopped doing ministry,” Erwin said. “There’s an excitement among the members. They can’t wait to see how far we’ve come each week.”

Obviously, the church lost a lot in the flood—pianos, pews, furniture and fixtures. Erwin particularly feels the loss of books that had belonged to his father, who also was a pastor, and files of sermons his father had written.

Even so, he chooses not to dwell on what was lost. Rather, he gives thanks for what the church gained.

“What we lost were just things,” he said. “We found out you’ve got to get beyond things.”

He particularly finds joy in visiting other pastors of churches that are in the midst of hard times to deliver one simple message: “There is hope.”

WASHINGTON (RNS)—President Trump unveiled a new initiative that aims to give faith groups a stronger voice within the federal government and serve as a watchdog for government overreach on religious liberty issues.

Trump signed the executive order May 3, the National Day of Prayer, “to ensure that the faith-based and community organizations that form the bedrock of our society have strong advocates in the White House and throughout the federal government,” a White House document reads.

The White House said those working on the initiative will provide policy recommendations from faith-based and community programs on “more effective solutions to poverty” and inform the administration of “any failures of the executive branch to comply with religious liberty protections under law.”

Trump said his initiative would help assure that the government supported people of faith.

“This office will also help ensure that faith-based organizations have equal access to government funding and the equal right to exercise their deeply held beliefs,” he said. “We take this step because we know that in solving the many, many problems and our great challenges, faith is more powerful than government, and nothing is more powerful than God.”

‘Takes more than a proclamation’

Government and religious organizations can partner in a constitutional manner, but it demands great care and hard work, said Amanda Tyler, executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty.

“Details matter. We know from our experience and advocacy efforts with the prior two administrations that government and religious organizations can partner in constitutional ways to deliver social services, but that getting it right takes more than a proclamation and a Rose Garden ceremony,” Tyler said.

“Standing up for religious freedom requires both protecting the free exercise rights of all Americans and ensuring that government neither promotes any one faith tradition nor favors religion over irreligion.”

Previous partnerships

The creation of the White House Faith and Opportunity Initiative follows the initiatives of previous administrations that created similarly named offices to foster partnerships between the government and religious organizations.

President Obama launched the Office of Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships, whose work ranged from fighting the Ebola and Zika viruses to feeding schoolchildren nutritious meals in the summertime.

That office, along with similar ones in 13 federal agencies, followed President George W. Bush’s Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. The White House said agencies and executive departments that do not have such offices will have a designated liaison to the new initiative.

Trump supporters cheer initiative

Johnnie Moore, a minister and public relations consultant who serves as an unofficial spokesman for a group of evangelicals that often advises Trump, said the new initiative takes an approach different from the previous ones.

“Ordering every department of the federal government to work on faith based partnerships—not just those with faith offices—represents a widespread expansion of a program that has historically done very effective work and now can do even greater work,” he said.

Pentecostal televangelist Paula White, an evangelical adviser to the president, cheered the new initiative.

“I could not be more proud to stand with President Trump as he continues to stand shoulder to shoulder with communities of faith,” she said. “This order is a historic action, strengthening the relationship between faith and government in the United States, and the product will be countless transformed lives.”

The White House also said the new initiative will be led by an adviser who will work with faith leaders and experts outside the federal government. Obama’s initiative also had an office director with a council of outside experts.

With additional reporting by Managing Editor Ken Camp.

DALLAS—Joanna Jespersen, minister to children and families at Shiloh Terrace Baptist Church in Dallas, will nominate Jason Burden, pastor of First Baptist Church in Nederland, for first vice president of the Baptist General Convention of Texas.

“I have known Jason and Kristi Burden for several years. They are some of the best of who we are as Texas Baptists,” Jespersen said.

Burden has been pastor of churches of varied sizes and “has led each one with distinction,” Jespersen said. “He is not only a great pastor; he is also a friend to pastors.”

Kristi Burden is an author, blogger, teacher and “fantastic pastor’s wife,” she added, noting together they make “a great team.”

Jespersen particularly singled out Burden for his ministry after Hurricane Harvey hit Southeast Texas.

“His leadership in the Texas Gulf Coast region after Hurricane Harvey was second to none,” she said. “He led FBC Nederland to host the Baptist Men of North Carolina (disaster relief team), and FBC Nederland became a major contributor during this difficult time during our state’s history.”

‘Been so well served by Texas Baptists’

Seeing the ministry Texas Baptists provided to churches, families and individuals along the Gulf Coast after the hurricane hit underscored his commitment to cooperation and his appreciation to other Baptists in the state, Burden said.

“I would be honored to serve Texas Baptists because I have been so well served by Texas Baptists,” he said.

In the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey last year, pastors in Southeast Texas found encouragement in the many expressions of concern shown by Baptists around the state, he said.

“We were the recipients of a lot of grace and kindness,” Burden said. “Our Texas Baptist friends and family reached out, called to check on us and brought resources to us.”

Some members of First Baptist in Nederland still have not been able to move back into their homes, but the church facility escaped serious damage, he said.

So, this summer, the Nederland church will house volunteer rebuilding groups, particularly teams from the BGCT’s Bounce student disaster recovery program.

“We’ll turn our building into Hotel First Baptist Church,” Burden said.

Strength in relationships

If elected, Burden said, he wants to “bear witness to the strength we find in our relationships” and to highlight the good things Texas Baptists are able to achieve through cooperation.

In a society characterized by “a lack of civility,” Texas Baptists have the opportunity to model how diverse people can work together in harmony to achieve “a God-sized mission,” he said.

Burden, who grew up in Hico, earned his undergraduate degree from Tarleton State University and both a Master of Divinity degree and a Doctor of Ministry degree from Baylor University’s Truett Theological Seminary.

He has been pastor at First Baptist Church in Nederland since 2011. His previous pastorates include Dorcas Wills Memorial Baptist Church in Trinity and First Baptist Church in Chilton. His first ministry experience was as volunteer youth pastor at First Baptist Church in Iredell.

He has served as moderator both in Golden Triangle Baptist Association and Falls Baptist Association. He also served on the BGCT Committee to Nominate Executive Board Directors and on the Committee on the Annual Meeting.

He and his wife Kristi have three children—Hayden, 21; Hallie, 17; and Rylie, 12.

PLANO—First Baptist Church in Plano is mourning the loss of a couple killed in an April 23 car accident and seeking to minister to seven children left without their parents.

Michael Scott Owen, 52, and Jennifer Owen, 47, were returning home from a camping trip with six of their children when the wreck took place near Sulphur Springs.

The husband and wife were transported to a hospital in Tyler, where both died from their injuries.

Michaela Owen, 15, and Dalton Owen, 10, were transported to a Dallas hospital, where they remain in critical but stable condition.

Four other children—Mitchell, 13, Alysa, 11, Samantha, 7, and Liam, 5—were treated at a Sulphur Springs hospital and released.

The eldest son, Ethan Owen, 23, was not in the car. He now “carries the responsibility of hourly decisions that must be made regarding his two critically injured siblings and the other surviving four,” a statement from First Baptist Church said.

“Scott and Jennifer Owen were faithful leaders in our church and in the community. They had servant hearts, and they were very family-oriented,” Pastor Craig Curry said.

“We are heartbroken. This family is precious to us, and we will do everything we can to help the Owen children now and in the future.”

First Baptist Church of Plano is directing any contributions made to its local benevolence fund toward the Owen children.

WACO (RNS)—A dozen pastors known for their consistently stellar performances in the pulpit made Baylor University’s list of the most effective preachers in the English-speaking world.

Baylor released the list of 11 men and one woman, chosen by scholars of homiletics—the art of preaching—May 1.

“In a world where talk is cheap and there seems to be no end to it, the preacher has to recover the priority and power of the word,” said Hulitt Gloer, director of the Kyle Lake Center for Effective Preaching at Baylor’s Truett Seminary.

“Words are the tools of the preacher and that gives them incredible power,” Gloer added.

The dozen preachers in the top 12—academics, pastors and authors—were picked from nearly 800 nominees.

Preaching experts in the Academy of Homiletics and the Evangelical Homiletics Society judged how much nominees’ preaching matched criteria that included their selection of biblical texts, the relevance of their sermons and their ability to deliver them in language people can understand.

It’s been 22 years since Baylor last produced such a survey. The Baylor preaching center sent the 1996 criteria to more than 500 homiletics professors for their input on criteria for the new survey. Members of the two homiletics societies were then asked to nominate as many as five people who met the new criteria. A total of 179 members—more than 30 percent of the membership of those two societies—submitted names. The final choices were narrowed down from 39 individuals who received the largest number of nominations.

Here are the 12 most effective preachers they selected:

Alistair Begg has been senior pastor at Parkside Church in Cleveland since 1983. He also is the Bible teacher on the radio and online program “Truth For Life.” A member of the council of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, Begg has written numerous books.

Tony Evans is the founding pastor of Dallas’ Oak Cliff Bible Fellowship, which began in his home in 1976 and has grown to a membership of almost 10,000. Evans is the first African-American to earn a doctorate in theology from Dallas Theological Seminary. The radio and television broadcaster has been the chaplain 30 years for the Dallas Mavericks basketball team.

Joel Gregory is the George W. Truett Endowed Chair in Preaching and Evangelism at Baylor University’s Truett Theological Seminary. A preacher for 50 years, he gave the concluding message at the 2017 Baptist World Congress in Durban, South Africa. He is a member of the Baptist World Alliance Commission on Worship and Spirituality and edited Baptist Preaching: A Global Anthology.

Timothy Keller is the founding pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church in New York City. He also chairs Redeemer City to City, a leadership development organization that starts new churches in urban centers worldwide. Keller is the author of several books, some listed among The New York Times bestsellers.

Thomas G. Long is an emeritus preaching professor and director of the Early Career Pastoral Leadership Program at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology in Atlanta. His textbook The Witness of Preaching is used in theological schools across the globe. He also was named one of the 12 most effective preachers in Baylor University’s 1996 survey.

Otis Moss III is the senior pastor of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. The activist, author and filmmaker is an ordained minister in the Progressive National Baptist Convention and the United Church of Christ. He is on the board of The Christian Century magazine and is a chaplain of the Children’s Defense Fund’s Samuel DeWitt Proctor Institute for Child Advocacy Ministry.

John Piper is chancellor of Bethlehem College and Seminary in Minneapolis. The leader of desiringGod.org has served as pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Minneapolis 33 years. He is the author of more than 50 books.

Haddon Robinson was the former president and Harold John Ockenga Distinguished Professor of Preaching at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in Boston. His book Biblical Preaching remains in use in Bible colleges and seminaries worldwide. Robinson, who died July 22, 2017, was named one of the 12 most effective preachers in Baylor’s 1996 survey.

Andy Stanley is the senior pastor of an Atlanta suburban mega-church with six locations. He also is the founder of North Point Ministries, a global network of more than 30 churches. A 2010 survey of U.S. pastors by Outreach Magazine identified Stanley as one of the top 10 most influential living pastors in America.

Charles Swindoll is the senior pastor at Stonebriar Community Church in Frisco. The radio preacher is the author of more than 70 books. He was named one of the 12 most effective preachers in Baylor’s 1996 survey.

Barbara Brown Taylor, an Episcopal priest, author and theologian, has served as a faculty member at institutions including Mercer University’s McAfee School of Theology and the Certificate in Theological Studies program at Arrendale State Prison for Women in Alto, Ga. In 2014, she was named to Time magazine’s list of the 100 most influential people in the world. She was named one of the 12 most effective preachers in Baylor’s 1996 survey.

Ralph Douglas West is founder and senior pastor of The Church Without Walls in Houston, which has grown from 32 members to more than 24,000 families. He is an adjunct professor of preaching at Truett Seminary. The radio broadcaster is the author of several books.

Baylor University’s Center for Christian Philosophy and its Institute for Studies of Religion received a three-year, $2 million research grant from Templeton Religion Trust. The grant will allow a multidisciplinary team of scholars to study the virtue of accountability and its relation to other human goods, including conscientiousness, empathy, humility, forgiveness and gratitude. The research project will begin this fall. Stephen Evans, university professor of philosophy and humanities and director of Baylor’s Center for Christian Philosophy will serve as project director, working alongside co-directors Byron R. Johnson, distinguished professor of the social sciences and director of the Institute for Studies of Religion, and Sung Joon Jang, research professor of criminology.

Ken Coffee, retired associate director of the Baptist General Convention of Texas State Missions Commission and former executive director of San Antonio Baptist Association, and Virginia Connally, first female doctor in Abilene and Baptist philanthropist, will receive the 2018 Texas Baptist Legacy Awards. The awards will be presented at 10 a.m., June 3 at the historic Independence Baptist Church at 10400 FM50 near Brenham. Lunch will follow the worship service. To make a reservation for the meal, call Becky Brown at (214) 828-5301 or email becky.brown@texasbaptists.org.

East Texas Baptist University recognized Jacqueline Ramos as the 2018 J. Ward Walker Lecturer. The university’s integration of faith and learning committee selected Ramos, coordinator of academic support for the ETBU office of academic success, for the award, named for a former vice president of spiritual life. Recipients of the annual award are selected based on their exemplary and consistent engagement of faith with scholarship, teaching, or administrative service. Ramos—who holds both an undergraduate degree in psychology and master’s degree in counseling from ETBU—serves with Buckner Family Pathways and on the worship team at New Beginnings Baptist Church in Longview.

The Howard Payne University Woman’s Club awarded the 2018-19 Yellow Rose Scholarship to Katie Cravey, a sophomore communication major. The Woman’s Club awards the scholarship annually to a female student who will begin her junior year the upcoming fall semester and has maintained at least a 3.0 grade point average since beginning her freshman year at HPU. The recipient is expected to have participated in campus extracurricular activities and exhibited leadership qualities representative of the Christian values and beliefs fundamental to the university. Cravey is a member of the Christian service sorority Delta Chi Rho, a participant in Baptist Student Ministry and a volunteer leader of high school girls at First Baptist Church in Brownwood. She has been a leader of new-student orientation, a staff writer for the student newspaper and a participant in seven HPU theater productions. She also has volunteered at the Huntsville Children’s Theatre Camp, assisted with the Huntsville Community Theatre as stage manager and worked as a camp counselor at Camp Eagle in Rocksprings.

East Texas Baptist University recognized Lauren McCollum at the 71^st annual Senior Girl Call-Out, the university’s most longstanding tradition. Selected by campus community vote, the individual “called out” each year is distinguished for exemplary Christian character, social consciousness, personal poise, academic achievement and spiritual vision. McCollum, a nursing major from Midlothian, is a member of First Baptist Church in Marshall. She served on the ETBU chapel worship team and the women’s ministry worship team. She has been involved in the honors program and served as a resident assistant. Twenty-eight young women participated in the Senior Girl Call-Out event alongside their “little sisters”—underclassmen chosen by the seniors.

Anniversary

175^th for First Baptist Church in Caldwell. Steve Johnson is pastor.

Chad Perry to Clearfork Baptist Church in Hawley as pastor.

The president of a Southern Baptist Convention seminary has defended an 18-year-old recording describing his counsel to a woman in an abusive marriage that is finding a new audience on social media in the age of #MeToo.

Paige Patterson, president of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, issued a statement April 29 accusing Internet critics of “deliberate misrepresentation of my position.”

On Sunday, the Washington Post carried a story quoting from an audio recording of part of a presentation Patterson gave at a meeting sponsored by the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood—a group that advocates different but complementary roles for husbands and wives in marriage—in 2000.

Read it at Baptist News Global.

WASHINGTON (RNS)—James H. Cone, the scholar known as the “founder of black liberation theology,” died April 28. He was 79.

The author of such books as Black Theology & Black Power and God of the Oppressed joined the faculty of New York City’s Union Theological Seminary in 1969.

“In so many ways, James Cone has been Union Theological Seminary for the past 50 years,” said Union President Serene Jones. “To say his death leaves a void is a staggering understatement. His prophetic voice, deep kindness and fierce commitment to black liberation embodied not just the very best of our seminary, but of the theological field as a whole and of American prophetic thought and action.”

His theology contrasted sharply with traditional theological approaches in that he articulated God’s identification with blacks in the United States. In portraying Christ’s blackness, he upended the assumptions of a field dominated by white theologians and helped spawn other theories of liberation.

In the introduction of his most recent book, The Cross and the Lynching Tree, Cone noted he was making connections many others had not.

“Despite the obvious similarities between Jesus’ death on a cross and the death of thousands of black men and women strung up to die on a lamppost or tree, relatively few people, apart from black poets, novelists and other reality-seeing artists, have explored the symbolic connections,” he wrote.

Cone’s book was honored with the 2018 Grawemeyer Award in Religion, a joint award from Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary and the University of Louisville. In April, he was elected as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, an honor earlier received by former President Barack Obama, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and author and educator Ta-Nehisi Coates.

A native of Fordyce, Ark., Cone was an ordained minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church.

Cone was promoted to the position of full professor of theology in 1973 at Union and was named the Bill & Judith Moyers Distinguished Professor of Systematic Theology in 2017. He taught and researched Christian theology at the seminary, focusing on black liberation theology and the liberation theologies of Africa, Latin America and Asia. He also taught about 19th- and 20th-century European-American theologies.

The bishops of the AME Church said Cone “touched, trained and molded generations of Ph.D. trained theologians and prophetic Christian servant leaders serving in pulpits and ministries around the world. Dr. Cone was truly a hero and ‘shero’ maker.”

Cornel West, Harvard Divinity School professor of the practice of public philosophy, summed up the life of his friend and colleague: “James Cone was the theological giant and genius in our midst! He was the greatest liberation theologian to emerge in the American empire—and he never ever sold out.”

LUBBOCK—Daniel “Tiny” Dominguez, pastor of Community Heights Church in Lubbock, plans to nominate a fellow Lubbock pastor, Jason Atchley from Bacon Heights Baptist Church, for second vice president of the Baptist General Convention of Texas.

‘A heart to see the kingdom of God advance’

“Jason loves our Texas Baptist churches and institutions, and he has a heart to see the kingdom of God advance,” Dominguez said.

Atchley can relate to leaders of churches across Texas Baptist life because he has served in a variety of ministry roles in congregations and communities of various sizes, he added.

Dominguez noted his congregation and Bacon Heights have served together on mission endeavors and worshipped together in Christmas Eve services in a “true partnership” of equals.

“One of the things I love about him is the fact that he can relate across generations,” Dominguez said. “He has a great respect for silver-haired leaders and a heart for young leaders. He cares about Millennials and wants to see them take ownership of opportunities to advance the gospel.”

Encourage young pastors

Atchley, 42, said he agreed to allow his nomination in part because he wants to affirm young leaders in Texas Baptist churches and challenge them to increase their involvement in the BGCT.

“I hope to encourage the next generation of young pastors to step out and step up into leadership roles in Texas Baptist life—not out of any desire to advance their careers but to expand the kingdom,” he said.

Atchley expressed appreciation for the leadership current BGCT officers have provided and for the work of BGCT Executive Director David Hardage.

“I hope we can help our churches maintain a spirit of unity, and for those that are not giving to the Cooperative Program, that we can encourage them to become more involved in our convention’s work overall,” he said.

‘Learn to listen’

Atchley noted he benefited from the example of good mentors in ministry who taught him the discipline of listening.

“If we want to deepen our fellowship as Texas Baptists, we really need to learn to listen to each other,” he said.

Given the foster care crisis in Texas and the changing dynamics of families, Atchley also expressed his desire to see the BGCT provide resources to help churches meet families’ needs—particularly in equipping parents to become “biblical mentors for their children.”

Atchley, a native Texan who grew up in Midland, has been pastor at Bacon Heights Baptist Church in Lubbock three years, and he is a part-time adjunct faculty member at Howard Payne University.

Previously, he served First Baptist Church in Decatur two years as pastor of adult and family ministries. He served 18 years as pastor to students at Jonesboro Baptist Church, between Gatesville and Hamilton; First Baptist Church in Hamlin; First Baptist Church in Canyon; and First Baptist Church in Round Rock.

Atchley earned his undergraduate degree from Howard Payne University, and he holds both a Master of Divinity degree and Doctor of Ministry degree from Hardin-Simmons University’s Logsdon Seminary.

He serves on the BGCT Committee on Nominations for Boards of Affiliated Ministries.

He and his wife Heather have been married 24 years and have two daughters, Hallee and Chloe.

FORT WORTH—A Fort Worth congregation opened its doors to the Mexican Consulate to help Mexican citizens in North Texas obtain proper identification to avoid legal problems.

Azle Avenue Baptist Church made its facilities available to the Dallas-based Mexican Consulate General and its “consulate-on-wheels” service, to enable Fort Worth-area Mexican citizens obtain birth certificates, consular identification cards and passports.

“People need to have a valid form of identification in case they have any interaction with police officers,” said Fernando Rojas, pastor of Azle Avenue Baptist Church. He noted the church offered the service in response to SB4, the so-called “show me your papers” law, which Gov. Greg Abbott signed one year ago.

“Having an ID could be the difference between receiving a ticket, or a warning and being sent to the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement,” Rojas explained.

The consulate is located 35 miles west of Azle Avenue Baptist, on the other side of the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex.

Rafael Solis, director of the church’s Vida Nueva Immigration Service and the congregation’s former pastor, recognized working people would have difficulty taking time away from their jobs to make the drive to the Dallas consulate office.

So, he contacted the Mexican Consulate to see what services could be offered in Fort Worth, and he learned about the “consulate-on-wheels” program that serves communities within 70 miles of the consulate office.

Azle Avenue Baptist subsequently invited the “consulate-on-wheels” program to its facility, and the program began taking appointments April 19. Within two days, more than 700 people had scheduled a time to process their documents.

“We want to impact our community and extend out our arms, like the arms of Christ,” Solis said.

Azle Avenue church members volunteered to assist visitors with parking, organizing waiting lines, and guiding people where they needed to go. The church also provided food and drinks for the consulate staff.

“A church must be generous with its time and its building,” Rojas said. “We want our guests to feel comfortable here.”

Azle Avenue wants to serve its neighbors and to let the surround community know it cares, Rojas said.

“People have needs, and God has given us the opportunity to respond to those needs,” he said. “We believe God loves our community, and we, then, must show that love.”